How easy it would be if I could say, a doctor, lawyer, engineer, IT consultant, architect, etc … but working as an affiliate is kind of vague isn’t it? When explaining it, I usually refer to amazon, as they were one of the pioneers of affiliate programs. I explain to them when they are surfing the web and they see an amazon book on a website, well if they click on that book it leads them to amazon, and if they buy, the website owner gets a commission etc… If that doesn’t work, then I will talk about one of the myriad of offline referral type companies and referral commissions, refer a friend to your bank = get $25, car insurance referral = get a free gas card, etc…

That being said, I still have to answer the question, What I do for a living. I’ve used the following in describing my profession:

• I’m an affiliate marketer
• I sell things online
• I manage websites
• I own an online media company
• I own a home business
• I’m an entrepreneur
• I own an internet business

I’m ready for a new one now, so if you have any ideas, share.
(and no not a spammer )

In relation to the last post, google credited my account, THANK YOU!

It’s simple to use, just enter your core keywords into digg and hit search. The most popular headlines that match your phrase come up. This is definitely not an exact science and is not a piece of software that will spit out perfect ads for you every time, but it will definitely get your juices flowing and make you more creative. Feel free to play around with the advanced search features as well.

For example take ‘weight loss’, below are 7 of the top 10 results given:

Notice anything special? 6 of these seven all have numbers in their headlines … Hmmm that must be important. Anyways, just wanted to throw this out there. I’m sure some of you can use this. You may also want to check out my post Ad copy: rational vs. emotional.

I know there are a handful of other tools on the web that are similar to help you out with ad copy, feel free to share if you have any.

The most notable ways it can affect your bottom line is: inflated impressions this can lower your CTR, which lowers your quality score and can raise your CPC. Not good. Another way is directly getting a lot of clicks, which will drain your budget. Enter negative keywords. Crafting a well developed negative keyword list can bring your campaign back in sync and give you a better ROI.

Below are 7 tips to help you in your negative keyword research:

1. Use the Search Engines

Take some time to search in google/yahoo/msn your core keywords and skim the results. Sometimes you will find sights that have different themes than what you are after. If it doesn’t match your product or service you might consider adding it as a negative keyword. For example search abs in google. Most people immediately think of 6 pack abs. But skim the results and you will find the organization of American Bureau of Shipping, site on anti-lock braking system, as well as ABS being a type of plastic … who knew?

2. Check out Google Suggest/Keyword Tool

Google suggest and their keyword tool are excellent ways to uncover phrases you’d never think of. You may also want to do a quick search in google news to make sure nothing current relates to your offer.

3. Thesaurus

Use this to get your brain juices flowing. It can also be a good tool to expand your keyword list and add parallel themes to your campaign.

4. Run a Search Query Report

Few people utilize the reports section in Google. Don’t be one of them. A search query lets you know the exact keywords being searched for in your campaigns. It does have an annoying category of other unique queries. Most tracking software can flesh these out …

5. Other Keyword Tools

There are a handful of keyword tools out there, some paid others not.

• WordTracker
• Keyword Discovery
• KW Map

6. Ebay!

Ebay sells anything and everything. If you’re doing retail type products, this is a good way to see if other product descriptions are similar to yours. Take for example “Maximizer” which is the product of a popular CRM (Customer Relationship Management – these things are very pricey) software. however a quick search in Ebay will also show curling irons, vitamins, indoor tanning lotion, audio plug-ins, pool cues etc…

7. Don’t forget your brain

This is your #1 tool hands down. We all want some fancy software where we type in a few keywords and *bam* it spits out everything we want. If you just take the time for a few hours to sit and think and brainstorm, both your keyword list and negative keywords will be much more accurate and worthwhile. Don’t be lazy!

Got another way of getting negative keywords? Share it with us ..

Well, I woke up this morning to find out I was over $700 in the hole! In my rush to finish I forgot to disable the search network as this was suppose to be a content only campaign. That little check box cost me a pretty penny. I hate to lose money, so any amount is not fun.

Yeah I could have had a lower budget, but content is usually slower to be approved so I figured by the time I wake up it would have just got going. Unlike search where it is usually pretty fast for me.

Moral of the story is don’t get sloppy when launching campaigns. I think I’m going to write up a pre-launch checklist just because of this as there are a handful of things that should be checked.

Ever wonder how some affiliate are able to dynamically insert the searched keywords on their landing pages? I remember for the longest time, I was always baffled by it, since I’m not much of a programmer or developer. Once I learned I felt kind of dumb since it is extremely simple with just a few lines of code added on your page. I’m sure there are a handful of ways to do this, but here’s how I do it:

Step 1

There is just 1 simple change on your destination URL’s in adwords. Just add
?kw={Keyword} to the end of your destination URL and you are done. For example if your destination URL is http://www.lander.com then the new URL would be http://www.lander.com/?kw={Keyword}

Step 2

Next at the top of your landing page insert this snippet of code

<?php
if(isset($_GET['kw']))
$key=$_GET['kw'];
else
$key=’Everything Else’;
?>

This picks up the value of the keyword being searched with an alternative text of “Everything Else”.

Step 3

Now every where you want your keyword to appear in your landing page just insert this piece of code
<?php echo $key;?> and your done! It is as simple as that.

Here are 3 examples:
http://www.ppcfool.com/keyword-insertion.php?kw=Whats up?
http://www.ppcfool.com/keyword-insertion.php?kw=Anyone Can Do This
http://www.ppcfool.com/keyword-insertion.php?kw=Sign-up for my RSS Now!

Why this is important?

Adding the searched keyword can help your conversions. Anything on your landing page that the searcher is familiar with boosts your credibility and relevancy. How many times have you searched for something, landed on a page and thought ‘this has nothing to do with want I’m looking for?’

Dynamic keyword insertion will give your page more relevancy which will help conversions

Want more landing page tips? Check out my 10 day series on landing pages!

Assuming your ad copy and lander are optimized, three things come to my mind when thinking about dropping keywords:

The Revenue Rule

A good rule of thumb that I follow is to wait until that keyword has accumulated about 2-3 times in cost what the payout would be. Example, if the payout is $30, then if a keyword racks up over $90 in clicks with no conversions. Time to cut it loose. Now if the keyword is in the top 3 positions or you really think the keyword has potential, you may want to lower the bid and wait it out. Dropping just a few positions can drastically cut the cost per click.

The Click Rule

I’ve read in other places waiting until you reach a certain number of clicks. Same concept as above. Waiting about 100-200 clicks will definitely get you some significant data. This is no exact science, but after 200 clicks most likely it’s not worth your time. This may also depend on what your target conversion is. If you’re assuming a 2% conversion, then 200 clicks is enough. But if you’re only counting on .5% conversions, then maybe not.

The Worthless Keyword Rule

Apart from above, you should be trimming your keyword lists every so often, especially in the beginning. 1-2 weeks after launching a campaign, go back over those keywords with 0 impressions and get rid of them. The same with getting lots of impressions with 0 clicks. Now that could be because your ad position is in 8,9,or 10 or maybe your ad copy is off. Raise your bids a little and double check your ad copy, but if still after 1 more week and no clicks my suggestion is to drop it.

I’m sure there are other ways of doing this, would love to hear your thoughts. To be honest, I always kind of do this on the fly and just eyeball it. It’s always good though to have some general rules

I’m sure you’ve seen these before, if not there a neat way to generate misspelled and missed typed keywords.

If its a highly searched keyword you should be able to add a couple hundred impressions just from the typos and often times the clicks are much cheaper

Let me know what you guys think …

Searches are not done independent from everything else, there is a process going on in the searchers mind. I like to call this the search time continuum. Fancy huh? Actually, this is nothing new, and there is a lot of writing on it.

Basically, there are 3 distinct phases when someone is searching

1. Information gathering
2. Review and Compare
3. Ready for action: buy, signup, commit

For example, a young lady goes off to college and along with her new freedom begins to eat whatever she wants. It is not too long that she begins to gain weight. At first it is just a nuisance, and she checks online, dieting tips, eating healthy, and proper exercise. Here she is just gathering information.

After several months, with no improvement, its more of a problem now. She’s overweight and she knows it. She begins to notice advertisements for losing weight, fad diet foods at the grocery store, and even late night infomercials. She goes online and begins to look at reviews for different products. This is the review & compare phase.

Its the end of her first year and the freshman dance is coming up. No one asks her. She blames it on her weight. This is the tipping point. This problem needs to be solved. She remembers one TV commercial about losing 10lbs. in 1 month, zips straight there online and buys. This is the buy & commit phase.

I hope you can appreciate this little story I whipped up. This is not exactly how it works, but should give you an idea about how searchers are thinking. Do you think when she is ready to buy she will be searching for ‘dieting weight loss secrets’? Maybe but not likely.

Get into the head of your prospects and you will be much more successful. Stay tuned for my next post where we connect these keywords into writing magnetic ad copy.